Of Inks

Regularly, I alternate between different inks depending on the coloring medium, paper, or where I’m drawing.

Recently, I got a hold of these:



Faber Castell PITTs. India-based ink, comes in a large assortment of sizes. In the 8 pack, I don’t like the soft brush or soft chistle as I have no control over my strokes with them. The other large size I only use to write signs, but it’s good for filling in black spaces, I guess.

India ink is water proof, but not 100% alcohol proof. On many paper types you need to let the inks dry for a few hours before grinding your markers on it like I do. If you just color flats or do light blending, the ink holds off pretty well! On mixed media paper, the inks still smeared from my markers a day after inking.

Faber Castells are my go-to markers for moleskine paper and watercoloring.



This is the smaller pack of the pens. Has three nib sizes plus the classic brush which is awesome for thickening some of the lineart. The bigger pack has an Extra Small (XS) nib which I find nice for fixing some jagged lines.



More india ink, Speedball wasn’t fucking kidding when they put “Super black” on the label. It’s gorgeously black. I use this at home when I’m drawing larger things (like a character portrait on 9x12 bristolboard) or on textured paper like watercolor pads. I can’t get regular pen strokes to stay consistent when I draw large or on bumpy surfaces, so this does the job and so nicely.

But wow does this ink suck with alcohol markers! I inked a commission with this, colored it almost two weeks later and the lines STILL smeared. I think the same thing happened with mixed media paper. Watercolors won’t budge it, though.

I found Acrylic ink to be better with markers but you have to shake the bottle regularly because whatever dry bits come up will mix in and you’ll be inking with little black specks.



Pigma Dengars. You will find yourself replacing these a lot, but they are cheap and are totally marker proof. They’re even completely marker proof in more paper types than copic pens and stroke over textured surfaces better than other pens. Do not diss the pigmas. The brush pen… I don’t like it too much. I just manually vary line widths by juggling the other pen sizes.

Most of mine are dead right now, so I’m currently using the Faber Castells for my marker work. Carefully.



Copic Multiliners. They come plastic disposable and metal refillable.It lasts a bit longer, the ink is a little blacker than microns, and if I remember correctly, a copic representative said that their 0.05 pen is the smallest nib in the whole technical pen market. It is of course Marker proof.

I bought three of these about three years ago, I think. a 0.05, a 0.3, and a brush. the brush dried out quickly with the brush itself getting too busted to be useful for details anyway, and the 0.05’s nib also broke so I couldn’t use that one anymore. I kept the 0.05 in a drawer, and when my 0.3 ran out of ink, I swapped the cartridges.

Owning the metal copic multiliners is like owning a set of Samsung electronics. As good as they are, If you’re a clumsyfuck, you’re going to break them.

For a while, my technical pen set was basically a Micron 005, Copic 0.3, and microns 05 and 08.



I also have the Rotring art pen you gave me a while back, but its last ink cartridges have dried up. I have the pen itself stashed as a keepsake.